more...

Chigago History Books

by Richard C. Lindberg

A lavish photo and narrative essay of historic contemporary
Chicago from the earliest days of the Fort Dearborn
settlement through the opening of Millennium Park.

This hardcover
coffee-table edition features hundreds
of vintage photographs, maps and wood-cut drawings
juxtaposed with Chicago history and text supplied
by Rich and his co-author Carol Jean Carlson.
For Rich, it is quite a departure from crime,
politics, and sports and a year-long writing project.

Available in hardcover at all major
retail book outlets.

Winner of TWO Awards:
Society of Midland Authors 2009-2010 Biography Winner
&
Award of Excellence from the Illinois State Historical Society

The Gambler King of Clark Street: Michael C. McDonald
and the Rise of the Chicago's Democratic MachinePublished June 2009 in hardcover,
Southern Illinois University Press. (Elmer H Johnson &
Carol Holmes Series Criminology)

Rich's lifelong fascination with Michael
C. McDonald, Chicago's wily 19th Century political boss,
roué, and roguish gambler the McDonald story, a first-ever
biography about this enigmatic but mostly forgotten
gambler who built the foundation of the city's enduring
and eternally corrupt Democratic Machine still in power
after 120 years.

With swagger and bravado, "King" Mike elected mayors,
consulted with presidents, amassed a personal fortune
and suffered mightily at the hands of two feckless wives
who "done 'em wrong." With swagger and bravado, "King"
Mike elected mayors, consulted with presidents, amassed
a personal fortune and suffered mightily at the hands
of two feckless wives who "done 'em wrong."

His tragic personal life is interwoven with the intriguing
story of the rise of organized crime in the Windy City;
formulated by McDonald and his syndicate of gamblers,
sharpers, bondsmen, sluggers and crooked politicians
possessing colorful and oblique nicknames, a zest for
the high life, and a gift for larceny on a grand scale.

Chicago
by Gaslight: A History of Chicago's Netherworld, 1880-1920Chicago, IL:
Academy Chicago Publishers. Published in January 1996.
236 pages.

While Chicago's glorious past is
already well-known and well-documented, the "other" Chicago--a
time and place of gamblers, prostitutes, anarchists and
gangsters--has long been a fascinating subject for anyone
interested in the reality of how Chicago became the metropolis
that it is today. The sleazy side of the city's past--its
red-light district, race riots, killers, the downtrodden
and the elites--is often forgotten by historians and researchers.

This handy pocket sized volume captures the spirit of
Chicago and the essence of the spoken word. The musings
of the famous, the infamous, and the forgotten dot the
pages of Quotable Chicago. Hear what Oscar Wilde, Richard
J. Daley, Dennis Rodman, Mark Twain, Dr. Martin Luther
King, Al Capone, Rudyard Kipling, William Butler Yeats,
Michael Jordan and Sarah Bernhardt all had to say about
the Windy City and its people.

This is Richard's best-selling book so far. Lively neighborhood
tours, restaurant reviews, listings of parades and festivals
augment a balanced history of the immigrant settlement
of Chicago. Chapters are organized and arranged in a chronological
format from Native Americans to the early arriving Irish
and Germans, up through the modern day era when the ethnic
landscape of the city increasingly reflected the emerging
Asian, Middle Eastern and Hispanic influence.

Chicago
Ragtime: Another Look at Chicago, 1880-1920South Bend, IN:
Icarus Press, 1985. 282 pages. Republished in trade paperback
as Chicago by Gaslight: A History of the Chicago
Netherworld, 1880-1920, by Academy Chicago, 1996.

This colorful and engrossing look back at the dark side
of Chicago during the Gilded Age was praised by the late,
great journalist and book author Herman Kogan for its
"prodigious amount of research and its host of new and
delicious details."

The hardcover edition of Chicago Ragtime is long out of print, but the author has a small number of copies available for purchase. Price: $20.00 plus $3.00 shipping. Send check or money order to P.O. Box 31343, Chicago, IL 60631

Four years of solitary research went into the preparation
of this book (begun as a graduate thesis at Northeastern
Illinois University). Lindberg's engrossing history of
the Chicago Police Department, its moments of shame and
valor, and the litany of scandal spread across 100 years,
was the first volume to be published on the subject since
John Flinn & John Wilke's History of the Chicago Police
(sold by subscription to fatten the coffers of the Policeman's
Benevolent Association) appeared in 1887.